Wedding comedy stumbles on way to the altar

Lewis Black’s “One Slight Hitch” is one slight farce, about the process of getting hitched.

The hitch in the plot is that the ex-boyfriend of the bride shows up, uninvited, during the frantic last-minute preparations for a wedding in an upper-middle-class Ohio household in 1983.

For reasons that defy sensible explanation, the ex-boyfriend wears only boxer shorts through most of the first act. Slamming doors and hiding under tables, he’s trying to elude discovery by half of the other characters.

He finally gets dressed for the second act. But near the end of the play, Black suddenly shifts gears. Without giving away what happens, it’s safe to say that the bride’s parents, rather than the bride and her ex, emerge as the leading characters.

This ending is softer and fuzzier than is customary from a farce -- or from Black, who’s best known as the perpetually disgruntled commentator on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show.”

The shift of emphasis isn’t a total shock -- or entirely unwelcome. In Daniel De Raey’s staging at the Falcon Theatre, the parent roles were cast with the most recognizable names -- Michael Learned and Granville Van Dusen. They get more opportunities for comic shtick than the supposed protagonists do.

But they still seem to be second bananas. Their chief task is to look and act frazzled.

Although the bride (Sherri Parker Lee) and her ex (Todd Babcock) are also drawn in shallow strokes, they nonetheless dominate most of the play’s scanty narrative.

If the ex-boyfriend had more to say, he could more easily assume the role of the play’s comic focus -- which appears to be Black’s original intent. But the ex hides in the bathroom through much of the play. He claims his arrival on the wedding day is a casual coincidence. We never learn much about his mad love for the bride or the roots of their relationship.

The bride has published a male-bashing book in which she describes many of the ex’s infractions. But in the play itself, she too skimps on details and recriminations.

The last-minute change of focus feels concocted, at least in part, because Black reached an impasse with the younger characters. Yet he wanted a happy ending, so he called on their elders, as he had earlier for many of the gags.

Learned and especially Van Dusen rally to the cause throughout the play with a repertoire of skillfully executed moments of agitation, exasperation and incipient intoxication. The more the father drinks, the funnier Van Dusen gets. But his farcical flair is taxed by two awkward bits in which he talks to unseen people who are just outside the front doorway yet say nothing in response.

The trio of younger actors in the pivotal parts (including Brendan Ford as the would-be groom) go through their paces with professionalism but without the distinctive signatures that might make their characters memorable.

Even the bride’s younger sisters, the suggestive one (Justine Brandy) and the sarcastic one (Senta Moses), are more sharply delineated than the purported leads.

The lack of a more interesting romantic triangle in “One Slight Hitch” is more than a slight hitch -- it makes the play feel bland and mechanical.

*

‘One Slight Hitch’

Where: Falcon Theatre, 4252 Riverside Drive, Burbank

When: Wednesdays to

Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 4 p.m.

Ends: March 14

Price: $25 to $37.50

Contact: (818) 955-8101

Running Time: 2 hours

Michael Learned...Delia Coleman

Granville Van Dusen...Doc Coleman

Todd Babcock...Ryan

Sherri

Parker Lee...Courtney Coleman

Justine Brandy...Melanie Coleman

Senta Moses...P.B. Coleman

Brendan Ford...Harper

By Lewis Black. Directed by Daniel De Raey. Set by Akeime A. Mitterlehner. Lighting by Steven Young. Costumes by Diana Eden. Sound by Robert Arturo Ramirez. Stage manager Sue Karutz.